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some rights reserved

If you’ve talked to me over my time here in China, especially lately, you know I’ve been struggling internally with a few different issues. One is the idea of copyright and the infuriating lack of access to things. Another is the absence of good translations, and also the wrongness/rightness of making derivatives/translations.

That said, I read a great treatment on the subject today. If you look at any part of my stuff that is online, you will notice that I have a creative commons license. While this may not be important to you, it is very important to me. It means you can use my stuff under certain conditions. This means that I don’t have to keep you from using any of it (which I think seems awful tight-fisted and I daresay unreasonable), but I also keep a ring around things. I like that, and I know that it is something I find much more… manageable and expectable. (Let’s be clear, I came into all of this a little late in the game and learned about it through Boingboing and Cory Doctorow‘s books.

In Something for Nothing: The Free Culture AudioBook Project, Suw Charman talks about this kind of license in action (I found this through Comixpedia). This is something I think is thrilling and shows hope for people going about a life and world where we influence each other in a sane way. I remember being in history class where I agreed that the idea of “owning” land was insane. I can understand how this was a key societal misunderstanding. To be honest, I think of many of the things that go on with copyright agreements to be similar, and I will be sure to work to ensure possibilities for future exploration with things that I create. I think it’s only fair, aside from which it is also extremely interesting.

As I get ready to launch my webcomic come fall, I am most certain which direction I will be going in for that work, and hopefully it will be something I can continue with content I produce.